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Thank you, Reuters for the info -

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Sprint Nextel Corp is considering spinning off or selling its Nextel unit, The Wall Street Journal reported on Monday, quoting people familiar with the situation.

Well, this would certainly be the easiest way for Sprint to abandon its iDEN network.  It makes sense to sell of the Nextel part of Sprint Nextel as a quick(er) and (relatively) easy way to solve the concerns of trying to merge two incompatible networks.  They could potentially give current iDEN users the option of getting into a CDMA device on the cheap or moving over to the new provider.  Of course, that's if the new owner actually maintains the network for consumers.  If one potential buyer gets his way (which is of course if Sprint decides to sell) the network could become a new haven for public safety organizations.

The report said Cyren Call, a company founded by Nextel founder Morgan O'Brien, is trying to assemble a consortium of investors to acquire Nextel.

Cyren's mission is to provide better communication for the nation's First Responders so that they can better react and communicate.

Bottom line?  My lay opinion is that selling off Nextel would give Sprint much-needed cash as well as the ability to focus solely on improving the CDMA network and building out WiMax without the distraction of trying to figure out how to integrate the iDEN users as well.

Strangely absent from any buyout rumors is SouthernLINC.  SouthernLINC Wireless is a regional iDEN carrier.  In fact, their handsets are identical to Nextel's iDEN handsets.  It would make sense for Sprint to offer them a sweetheart deal to take iDEN off their hands.  Selling to SouthernLINC would be great for customers on both sides:  Nextel customers would notice almost zero change except for the name on their bill and SouthernLINC would leap onto the national stage and become, almost overnight, a major player.  If they could extend their reputation for reliability (they were back up and running only 72 hours post-Katrina) onto the national stage...Verizon's claim to fame would be in serious jeopardy.

Here's the headline from the Wall Street Journal

Deutsche Telekom AG is weighing a bid to acquire Sprint Nextel Corp. that could catapult the German telecommunications giant's wireless arm, T-Mobile USA, to the No. 1 position in the U.S., according to people familiar with the matter.

The downside would be the enormous cluster-fudge of networks.  They'd have GSM, iDEN, CDMA and almost Wi-MAX.

We saw what happened when two companies "merged" (they called it a "merger of equals" but it was more of a buyout) that were running different networks.  We're talking Sprint and Nextel, duh.  There was no real plan for consolidation.  Constant changes of direction haven't helped.  Sprint used to be number 2 in what was the Big 5 (the lineup used to be AT&T, Sprint, Verizon, Nextel and T-Mobile) and Sprint's stock was in the low $20 range and generally on the rise.  Since the merger both sides of Sprint/Nextel have seen literally millions of subscribers and billions of dollars evaporate.

What I'm getting at is that DT/T-mobile seems to have its head on straight.  Other than the change from VoiceSteam to T-Mobile (which was done in the relative infancy of their US debut) they've never suffered an identity crisis (Like AT&T Cingular AT&T) and never had to transition from one network to another (like AT&T from TDMA to GSM or Nextel from TDMA to iDEN or Sprint from GSM to CDMA).  Unless they have a very clear roadmap for what they're going to do with their customers in regards to network there are going to be massive problems with a buyout of Sprint.  I would have to imagine that it would be something along the lines of moving their GSM customers to CDMA (most of their GSM handsets have a CDMA almost-twin).  Next would be either rolling out a nationwide Wi-MAX network for Wi-MAX airacrds and CDMA handsets that connect to Wi-MAX for data or potentially work in a dropping of Wi-MAX entirely and rely on EVDO for its data needs.  Because of the incentives usually offered to switch to the "favored" network, it would seem cheaper to abandon GSM.  However, GSM is more globally accepted and is a cheaper overall network.  I hope that if they merge they stick with CDMA because frankly, I've never been impressed with the call quality I've had when talking to someone with T-Mobile and never been anything but impressed with the call quality I've had with Sprint. 
Also, they'd need to work dropping iDEN into that plan too.

Except for the part where Sprint is saying Wi-MAX and VZE is saying LTE for 4th gen data a Verizon buyout of Sprint would make so much more sense, especially because Wi-MAX is still in a test deployment.

I'll admit, as I usually will, that I don't have any kind of degree in anything.  What I do have is experience.  I experienced the Sprint/Nextel merger first-hand and know how poorly it was handled.  It took them 3 years to decide that they should use the near-billion dollar city-sized campus in Kansas as their HQ (which also allows them to pay relocated employees less in accordance with their policy for reducing pay when transferring to an area with a lower cost of living) instead of the campus in Reston, VA (which is still only partially vacated).  They're just now, also three years later, rolling out handsets that will allow iDEN customers to completely move over to CDMA as opposed to the hybrid units that reduce iDEN traffic but don't really address the need to get rid of the entire network.  Any plan that came out didn't seem like it was that well planned and was then changed before it had a chance to take hold.  I have to assume that if I can see the huge potential for ginormous fail that the brains behind Deutsche Telekom must have as well.

If the buy happens (and it's a really, really, really big "if") it needs to be done with more planning, commitment and follow-through than would be needed in the acquisition of a competitor using the same type of network.  With Sprint's stock $30 away from the top 2 (AT&T and VZW) and DT's better, but not amazing in the upper teens, a poorly handled Sprint acquisition could very well put the new company in dire straights very quickly.  Were that to happen we could very easily see the Big 4 very quickly become the Big 2. 

So here's the roundup, Saturday style, once again.
As usual, here are the stock prices of the Big 4 at last trade on Friday, May 2nd.  Change is vs last trade on the previous Friday.

AT&T - $40.13 + $1.55
Verizon - $39.59 + $2.55
Deutsche Telekom (T-Mobile) - $18.11 + $0.21
Sprint - $7.89 - $0.02

VZW and AT&T are still in a dead heat for first in terms of stock price.  Sprint actually climbed into the low $8 range but news that it's June 26th deadline to vacate a big chunk of spectrum (details below) may cause it to leave up to 20 million iDEN users high and dry took it back into the 7's.

As usual, quotes thanks to Yahoo! Finance.

• On Friday a Federal Appeals court shot down Sprint.  There is a chunk of bandwidth that Sprint is currently using for its iDEN operations that is supposed to be vacated for use by emergency services.  Sprint is no where near being ready to vacate that spectrum and has no where to move the network traffic that will be left in limbo.  In theory, Sprint was going to take over the spectrum that is currently being used by those emergency services organizations.  The thing is, they aren't ready either.  Sprint is the one with the June 26th deadline and they could be left scratching their heads, wondering what the heck they're going to do when potentially millions of their iDEN subscribers have no network.
  According to a Wireless Week article from last November, around 20 million iDEN subscribers could be out of luck.  iDEN is the network technology used in Nextel phones and for the walkie talkie functionality in Sprint Nextel's hybrid phones.
  

Details at Yahoo!, by the Associated Press.

The rest of the roundup after the jump...

I saw this at mocoNews.net and was blown away.  It's the kind of simple, common sense stuff that gets so easily lost in the bureaucracy and over analyzing of a big corporation.

Guy Talmi is a Senior Marketing Director at Pontis, an Israel-based company that works with wireless and cable operators to help determine the most relevant marketing approaches based on a user's profile, preferences and behavior. Talmi has compiled a list of the top 10 most common marketing mistakes he sees made by the operator.

Here I'll just list the actual top 10, but you can click here to see the explanation of each over at mocoNews.

1.  Operators fail to target the right products to the right customers
2.  Free trial offers fail because of poor follow-up
3.  Introductory offers for new customers alienate existing customers
4.  Non-targeted offers look like spam
5.  Operators address churn too late
6.  Marketing campaigns may fail if not tested before launch
7.  Operators use the wrong medium to market to users
8.  Value the customer
9.  Operators miss marketing opportunities
10.  Success breeds success - if you can recognize it

When you get into the explanations it makes even more sense.
What he says in his summary, praising online retailers like Amazon for marketing based on past searches and purchases, is something that has been a little controversial.

There's growing concern among (mostly older) web surfers and purchasers that companies are keeping too much information about them.  I tend to shoot down these concerns, more vocally when referring to sites that are trying to monetize a free service, because there is a reason behind targeted advertising.  I think that Talmi would agree with me that targeted advertising and marketing, regardless of industry, can help companies save money and hopefully pass those savings onto their customers in the form of more competitively priced goods and services.

First, here's a little bit of the story that ran at CNN.com today

James Karl Buck helped free himself from an Egyptian jail with a one-word blog post from his cell phone.

...

Buck, a graduate student from the University of California-Berkeley, was in Mahalla, Egypt, covering an anti-government protest when he and his translator, Mohammed Maree, were arrested April 10.

On his way to the police station, Buck took out his cell phone and sent a message to his friends and contacts using the micro-blogging site Twitter.

The message only had one word. "Arrested."

After that one-word message was sent out James' followers started Tweeting and blogging about their friend's precarious situation.  One friend even got on the ball and hired a lawyer on James' behalf.  James was freed.

Less than 24 hours after he was arrested.

This is exactly the kind of thing that needs to be given the spotlight, and I'm super excited about seeing it on CNN.com.  It's the sort of thing that can further help to spread awareness of how Twitter can function as more than just a fun tool or even a professional one, both of which are hats it wears quite well.

The only failing I see is that it can only benefit Twitter.  If, as we rant about ad nauseum,  this good press could have benefited the entire social networking/blogging community.  We're always saying that Web 2.0 (And I'm caught playing Buzzword Bingo) companies, and those that are involved in social networking especially, should and need to form an industry organization to keep themselves safe from potential regulation hell.

Let's face it - Like it or not, a negative story will wash over an entire medium like wildfire.  Did Janet Jackson's nipple focus the ire of over-reacting, zero-responsibility, whack-job, non-parents on CBS and the NFL?  I think that we all know what the answer is there. As I've said about on-topic examples and as was discussed in our interview with Dr. Patrick Moore, it's true that forming an industry organization means working with your competitors.  But it's working with your competitors so that you can be allowed to compete and to keep your own set of rules.

I won't go into much more detail, because I'd basically be reposting old info (more than I have already).

I'll close by giving big ups to Twitter, of which Andrew and I are big old fanboys.  This kind of story is what can help to elevate a technology from "fun" to "professional" to that next level where it can be used for very serious situations.  The same way that text messages and mobile phones in general have, the latter over the past decade and the former over the past 4-5 years.

Twitter, great job!  Social Networking/Web 2.0 execs - Celebrate the good but team up and protect yourselves from the bad.

So here it is, a day late, but in no way short.  It's the Weekly Mobile News Roundup.  Let's jump right in, starting with the price-per-share (PPS) at last trade on Friday, 4/25 for the Big 4, posted highest-to-lowest with the amount of change over last Friday.

AT&T - $38.58 + $1.07
Verizon - $37.04 + $1.01
Deutsche Telekom (T-Mobile) - $17.90  -$0.05
Sprint - $7.91 + $1.24

As usual, AT&T and Verizon are pretty much tied for first place, with only $1.54 separating their PPS.  What's interesting is that Sprint gets the fancy highlight action with their leading $1.24/share gain over Friday 4/18.

Quotes from Yahoo! Finance.


More after the jump...

I'll admit that I'm probably the last guy who you'd expect to come out in favor of limiting a consumer's use of their own technology.  Well, I don't know that I am in favor of Skype not getting "Carterfoned" for use on U.S. mobile devices, but I certainly understand it.

Being able to have free, unlimited calling to other Skype-ers and dirt-cheap rates to other phones would rip the bottom out of the mobile phone industry.  Think about how many people would activate data-only plans or just get the cheapest rate plan to maintain an account with their carrier.  Either carriers would lose a ton of money or, more likely, we'd see the price of data-only plans soar to compensate for the loss in calling plan revenue. 

Also, keep in mind that one of the Big 4 is in pretty serious trouble.  I won't name names, but they've seen millions of customers and billions of dollars evaporate in the last 3 years, seen their stock plummet from a respectable low-$20's to about $6.50 and have been entirely unable to find their direction.  If Skype came in on mobiles we could see our Mystery Carrier shut down or get bought out.  We would lose 25% of the Big 4 national carriers and there would be an enormous number of jobs lost.

So if you're gearing up to scream about how stupid I am, I'm way ahead of you.  I get why people want Skype on their mobile and why they think they should be allowed to.  I understand it, I promise.  But at the same time, it's a really tricky situation that K-Mart (the FCC Chairman, not the retailer) is in the middle of.   Sometimes it's easy to say that  the Government  just likes to meddle or that they can't get their heads out of their asses, but this isn't one of those times.

Trying to find a balance between being pro-competition and (no exaggeration) protecting the future of an entire industry in this country - I'm not jealous.

First, apologies for the name change.  Last week was the inaugural edition of this feature and, well, there's tweaking to be done.  Sorry.

Big, big things happened in the wireless world this past week.  It seems like every week is bigger than the last lately.  I'm convinced that next week we'll be announcing the invention of a phone that will sing your baby to sleep while pouring you the perfect G&T and lighting your cigar.  Maybe not, but wouldn't that be a kick-ass phone?  Don'tcha think?

Anyway, just like last week, here's the week-ending stock prices of the big 4.  These are the prices of last trade on Friday 4/18, listed highest-to-lowest, with their change from last Friday.

AT&T - $37.51 + $0.21
Verizon - $36.03 + $0.47
Deutsche Telekom (T-Mobile) - $17.95 + $0.38
Sprint - $6.67 + $0.20

Stock Quotes from Yahoo! Finance.

Big ups to Verizon for the biggest gain from Friday to Friday.  Also, notice that stock leader (and Big Dog of the Big 4) AT&T and Sprint (Number 3 in the Big 4) had almost identical gains since last Friday.  Too bad that Sprint is still over $30 behind per share.

The rest of the roundup, after the jump...

Representatives Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) and Chris Cannon (R-UT) introduced the  "Cell Tax Fairness Act," which is CTIA's latest baby.  Basically, the act calls for a five-year hiatus on raising or introducing new mobile phone taxes.  These taxes are much higher than the average taxes on good and services and have grown at a rate of four times the rates of other sales taxes.  CTIA goes on to contend that having an industry that is growing and changing burdened by excessive taxes will stifle innovation.

But here's the entire CTIA press release, right from CTIA

WASHINGTON, DC - On Tax Day, CTIA-The Wireless Association® and its member companies are urging Congress to pass legislation requiring a five-year hiatus on new discriminatory state and local wireless taxes.  To achieve this goal, Representatives Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) and Chris Cannon (R-UT) introduced the "Cell Tax Fairness Act" today in the U.S. House of Representatives. 

"The wireless sector of the technology industry continues to be an important driver for growth in our nation's economy.  Americans don't just talk on their wireless phones anymore; they access the Internet, get information, pay bills and use wireless to be more productive at work and other every day activities, " said Lowell McAdam, CTIA-The Wireless Association® Chairman and Verizon Wireless President and CEO. "With about 15 percent of each customer's monthly bill already going to taxes and fees, increasing discriminatory and unfair taxes on wireless customers presents a clear and present danger to future growth.  Policymakers should roll back taxes on wireless customers."  

I think we've all encountered a Short Code, whether we knew it or not.  Any time that a TV show or radio station wants you to send a text message to a 5-digit number, you're being asked to use a Short Code.  Some cost extra money (especially those bastardly ones that sign you up for the joke of the day) and some just cost the same as a regular text message.  They're used for a variety of purposes.  San Francisco alt rock radio station Live 105 (KITS) uses them to conduct listener polls and as an avenue for receiving requests.  Twitter uses them so that you can send and receive Tweets via SMS.

Carriers have to reach agreements with the companies that distribute content and information via Short Code before their subscribers will have access to them.  Verizon Wireless (VZW) caused quite a stink when they decided not to allow pro-choice organization NARAL to distribute Opt-In messages to its subscribers via Short Code SMS.  VZW quickly reversed their decision.

Ars Technica has details on why the FCC should get involved

Tech freedom advocacy group Public Knowledge, Free Press and other groups were unsatisfied with Verizon's turnaround and have asked the FCC to issue a clear policy position that will block Verizon from engaging in similar practices in the future. Noting that the FCC already unambiguously forbids similar discrimination in voice calls and e-mails, the activist groups argue that there is no reason why those same protections shouldn't extend to SMS messaging, especially since it is becoming an increasingly important vector for communication.

Verizon has also been accused of denying short code access to companies that intend to use SMS to promote of facilitate services that compete directly with other services offered by the carrier. Critics argue that this practice stifles innovation and discourages third-party development of some SMS-based services that are potentially advantageous to consumers.

The first paragraph makes a lot of (common) sense.  I mean, if you can use your mobile phone to make an appointment at planned parenthood, why can't you receive equally pro-choice text messages?  There's always the argument (expressed later in the article) that if carriers are limited in censoring of text messages that spam messages could run amok.  Well, not really.  Federal Law already prohibits the heck out of that.

The second paragraph that we included sounds more than a little like the net neutrality stories that we've posted about (like Comcast and BitTorrent).  Could mobile phone carriers do the same thing by limiting Short Code access?  We've all seen ads on TV telling us to text something like VERYNICE to 12345 to get buy a Borat ringtone.  All of our mobile phone carriers sell ringtones too.  Well, if they decide that they'd rather have you buy their Ali G ringtone as opposed to someone else's, they could deny your access to that company's Short Codes.

The Net Neutrality/Reasonable Network Management debate and the one about Short Codes go hand-in-hand.  Seeing as how there would appear to be a precedent forbidding the restrictions on a voice call because of content, the same would seem to apply to text message content as well.  If that argument hold up, then, seeing as how Short Code/SMS censorship is so similar to "Reasonable Network Management" that could help usher in official Net Neutrality legislation.

Full article at Ars Technica.